India produces a large amount of sugarcane.
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A recent paper by Olivier Garsmeur and colleagues titled ‘The genomic footprints of wild Saccharum species trace domestication, diversification, and modern breeding of sugarcane’ in the journal Cell conducted genomic analyses of 390 sugarcane breeds from Australia, Brazil, China, France, French Polynesia, India, Japan, and the US.
These plants were hybrids of a variety of genes, with multiple chromosomes in them (polyploidy). Such polyploidy had occurred due to commercial transport by human breeders, who transported and sold sugarcane across various states in a country and across countries as well, including in Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia.
They also pointed out that while sugarcane is a cash crop that is used for its sweetness, it is also used to produce bioethanol, which is produced as a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels in private and public transport and commercial vehicles.
Sugarcane in India
India produces a large amount of sugarcane, particularly across 13 States. The top five States by production in 2018-2019 to 2023-2024 were Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and Gujarat. About 4,400 lakh tonnes of sugarcane were produced in 2024-2025.
The Indian Council of Agricultural Research has also established several sugar research institutes across the country that use classical botanical methods and molecular biological methods to improve the variety and yield of sugarcane. The oldest of these, which is the Sugarcane Breeding Institute in Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, conducted molecular genetic analyses of four different sources across India to study the genetic diversity between them. This was in 2006, with the researchers’ findings published in the journal Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution (53, 1221-1231).
While the aforementioned Garsmeur et al. paper used samples from the western countries and China, the Coimbatore group used samples from Arunachal Pradesh, Odisha, and Tamil Nadu. Upon genetic analysis, the researchers found that Arunachal Pradesh had the most diverse sugarcane breeds.
In a 2018 paper in 3 Biotech, scientists from the Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research in Lucknow also analysed the genetic diversity and population structure of 92 sugarcane varieties from subtropical parts of the country, again revealing the abundance of sugarcanes of many types in India.
Traditional medicine practitioners in China, India, and Pakistan have also been using sugarcane in their therapies. In this connection, a recent review from China, titled ‘The chemical composition and biological activities of sugarcane: Potential medicinal value and sustainable development’, pointed out that traditional Chinese medicine resources are facing serious problems in terms of sustainable development, causing a shortage that is being aggravated by changes in the natural environment and uncontrolled human harvesting.
Therefore, it is of great significance for the maintenance and development of traditional Chinese medicine resources to study those resources that have medicinal value and crop potential and to discover new uses for them. In their review, the authors discussed the chemical composition of sugarcane and its potential bioactivities, explored its applications in medicine, and charted the potential direction of future research.
As Grasmeur et al. also noted, sugarcane is also used to produce bioethanol, which is a greener alternative to diesel or petrol in passenger vehicles like cars and buses as well as for trucks. India has also started using sugarcane wastes, rice, and wheat to manufacture bioethanol, with the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas having started making bioethanol in Assam. In all, we look forward to a greener India with sugarcane.
Published – November 29, 2025 11:00 am IST
